Short-lived sheer joy

Last night, right around this time, I decided to scramble an egg for Lucy. I started to feed it to her with a spoon and immediately gave up. Instead I broke up the little pieces of egg and placed them on her tray.

She was ecstatic. Clasping her hands and feeding herself was never so much fun. Generally, you have to force food on Lucy. She assumes she isn’t going to like it. My advice to Donna one meal time, “Be aggressive.”

So I was snapping pictures, texting Henry and even called my parents. Soon after Henry arrived home, I was talking to my dad. My mom had just told me that she was surprised that I would give her eggs. She said, “I thought you were worried about her being allergic to eggs.”

“Oh, no,” I said. “She loves eggs. This is her new favorite food.”

As the phone was passed to my dad. I walked over to hold the phone out for Lucy to talk to Granddaddy. And as I leaned, I noticed bright red splotches all around her mouth. Tiny bits of egg topped the hives like little bity zits. I told Henry I thought she was allergic. My dad kept talking, as he does. Finally I told him I had to go and pretty much hung up on him.

We took away the eggs and washed her face. Then I called the doctor. She said it was a little early to introduce eggs, but now we know. She is allergic to eggs. She still seemed happy with only the hives as an apparent reaction. My doctor told me to give her Benadryl every six hours until the rash went away.

I went to buy some Benadryl at Safeway. But once I returned, the rash was so minor, I thought I could probably skip the meds. And she lived.

Good news is we are getting an allergy test at her one-year checkup. Bad news is I should give up eggs until then. It’s just two months. Just two months (plus a week or so). After giving up dairy, I think I can make it.